in virginia, 143%. and in colorado, ad spending has jumped by 146%. there's more. in seven days >> ifill: and the's more. in ven da, om september 13 to september 19, the romney campaign spent $425,000 in battleground colorado on 1,283 ads. the obama campaign spent $1.1 million on 2,891 ads. that's statewide. narrow the focus to one city, colorado springs, and the change is even more dramatic. at this time four years ago, 519 presidential campaign ads had aired in this top ten ad market. this year, the number jumped to 1,445. the newshour is partnering with kantar media/cmag and npr to keep track of all that spending. npr reporter ari shapiro spent the past week in colorado springs watching those television ads and talking to the voters who consume them. he joins us now. 395 million dollars. let's start with that number, ari. what is that all being spent on really? >> tv stations have a limited number of minutes for advertising. so you are seeing more ads per hour and you're seeing ads in different shows where you didn't used to. you know, game shows, soap operas, r